1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to plumbers' tools. More particularly, the invention concerns a waste line clean out apparatus for removing and cleaning away obstructions formed in and blocking the waste line.
2. Discussion of the Prior Art
A wide variety of waste line clean out devices have been suggested in the past. Normally, such devices embody an elongated clean out member known as a plumbers' snake. The plumbers' snake is ordinarily housed within a drum or hollow housing having a conical wall through which the spring or snake is fed and rotated actually of itself as the container is rotated to cause rotation of the spring. The feed mechanism for advancing the coiled spring into the waste line typically includes jaws, rollers, segmented nuts or like structures which grip the spring so that when the spring is fed through the feed while being rotated it is controllably advanced into or retracted from the sewer line. As a general rule, cutter means affixed to the free end of the plumbers' snake and functions to cut away and clear blockages formed in the sewer line.
A drawback of the prior art devices which embody rotating drums resides in the fact that a rotating drum cannot feed the coiled spring without the use of the gripping chuck of the automatic feed. Accordingly, when extreme resistance is encountered in the waste line, an unsafe condition can arise. The apparatus of the present invention uniquely overcomes this drawback.
One of the most successful prior art waste line clean out apparatus ever devised is illustrated and described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,242 issued to the present inventor. This patent describes an apparatus having certain components that are similar to the present apparatus and accordingly U.S. Pat. No. 5,193,242 is hereby incorporated by reference as though fully set forth herein.
Another highly successful prior art waste line clean out apparatus is described in U.S. Pat. No. 3,956,923 also issued to the present inventor.
Both of the prior art devices identified in the preceding paragraphs embody a relatively large rotatable drum which houses the enlarged coiled spring and imparts rotation thereto so that it can be advanced into and retracted from the waistline. As will be better understood from the description which follows, the apparatus of the present invention eliminates the rotatable drum and includes a highly novel means for selectively rotating the coiled spring so that it can be controllably advanced into and retracted from the waste line.